Mother of tragic 18-year-old said "he could not see tomorrow could have been a better day"

A heartbroken teenager hanged himself after splitting up with his girlfriend, an inquest has heard.

Charlie Green, 18, from Blackwater, hanged himself from a loft hatch after he learnt his relationship was over.

Just weeks before Christmas, his younger brother found him dead in the family home after getting in from school.

Recalling his painful experience at an inquest into Charlie’s death held last Thursday (January 30), his 16-year-old brother said: “When I arrived home the front door was locked, which I thought was strange, and all the lights were off apart for the landing light.

“I went upstairs and I was talking to him. After a long day he would often fall asleep on the landing.

“I thought I would get changed, I walked past him, I thought he was asleep.”

He said he thought it was strange that the loft was open, adding: “I started shouting at him, I got on the floor, shook him and shouted his name.

“I knew something was wrong so I phoned mum, she said [to] go next door. As I did I phoned the ambulance.

“When I went back to the house I started performing CPR and then the ambulance arrived and took over.”

Their mother Paula Penny told Alton Magistrates’ Court about her last moments with her son, who was training to become a bricklayer.

She described Charlie as "deeply sensitive" and that "he could not see tomorrow could have been a better day".

She said: “He was upset the night before. When he got home from college he said he had an argument with his girlfriend, he said she was with another boy at lunchtime and then said it wasn’t really an argument but she was a bit off with him.

"He texted her but she did not reply. He went out for a walk and when he came back he said he had a little cry.

“I said it would blow over and that he needed to have trust. I went back into his bedroom and he told me that she had finished with him.

“I said to give her some space.”

Charlie felt depressed following a previous relationship he had two to three years ago, the court was told.

Mrs Penny gave her son a kiss in the morning before she left for work as it was Charlie’s day off from college.

“If I had any doubt, I would have not have gone to work,” she remembered.

PC James Copley arrived at the house in Beaulieu Gardens just after 4pm on December 5 last year.

He said: “I was met by paramedics and his family. I was shown upstairs to the landing where I saw the body lying beneath a loft hatch.

“Handwritten notes all sealed in envelopes and a mobile phone was found in the bedroom.”

Coroner Andrew Bradley recorded a verdict of suicide.

Addressing Charlie's family last week, he said: “He had his entire life ahead of him and an emotional dent at that age usually brushes off.

“For an 18-year-old to say he had been hurt too many times is desperate. There is no doubt that he no longer wanted to be here.